"Woah… so those are human coins…"
"So shiny…"
At the center of town, a small group of elf children gathered around a tall sun elf as he showed them copper, silver, and gold coins. Their eyes sparkled, fascinated by the exotic currency.
The sun elf smiled gently and extended the coins toward them. "Do you want to hold them?"
At his question, all the children shook their heads, and some even took a step back. A wood elf among them said, "We can't! My mom says I shouldn't touch things made by humans!"
"Huh? Why not?" The sun elf was clearly puzzled, and scanning the rest of the children, they all seemed to agree.
"Cause they're bad!"
"Human things are cursed!"
A sea elf shuddered as he said, "My dad said that human coins are made with blood, so the richest humans have killed a lot of people to make those coins!"
The other children gasped at the sea elf child's story. The idea of using blood to make money sounded barbaric and cruel.
"What? That's…" The sun elf was about to say their parents were wrong, but he stopped himself just in time. He didn't want to call their parents liars—though he knew they were likely exaggerating, especially the last tale. He figured the father was referring to humans that profited off killing others like assassins and mercenaries which wasn't wrong per say, but the child misunderstood and thought it was made with literal blood.
He chuckled as he corrected the sea elf. "They aren't made from blood, it's metals, that's why they are called copper, silver and gold coins. And look." He shook the coins in his hand, causing them to jingle softly. "I'm holding them and I'm fine, right? Not all things made by humans are bad. A lot of it is actually good."
"Like what?" a small light elf girl asked.
"Like, umm… this!" Not expecting to be asked to present an example, the sun elf quickly scoured through his spatial ring to find something to prove his point. Most of it was weapons, which would definitely not help his case.
Luckily, he found something suitable: a metallic plate with a bowl-shaped indent and iron bars running across the top. The kids leaned in, having never seen anything like it.
The sun elf smiled and explained, "This is a portable cooking plate. With it, you can cook anything on the go—no need to start a campfire or know fire magic!"
He turned it on to demonstrate, lighting a small flame in the indent. Then he twisted a knob, making the flame grow and shrink as he twisted it back and forth. The children gasped and murmured excitedly.
With her eyes glued to the fire, the light elf girl asked, "So with this, we can cook like sun elves?"
Elves as a whole had extremely high affinity for the elements, making them superior in magic and even the direct manipulation of said elements. But unlike other races where affinities were mostly based on luck, an elf's affinity was based on their subrace. Sun elves, as their name suggested, were closely attuned to fire. It wasn't impossible for other elf subraces to control fire depending on the talents they developed, but they were inferior to a sun elf of equal skill. Because of this, sun elves weren't known just for using fire magic in combat—they were also the best chefs in Sylmasera. Almost all the most renowned cooks were sun elves.
This applied across all subraces. Earth and wood elves dominated construction and crafting; sea elves excelled at fishing; sky elves in music; light elves in healing—the list went on.
"What? No way!" a sun elf boy said, shocked by her question. "Even if you used that thing, I bet my food would taste better!"
"I don't know… you've burned it before. Maybe I could give it a go," the girl said, unconvinced.
"That—! That was one time!" The boy's tanned face turned pink with embarrassment causing laughter to burst out from the other kids.
While the children laughed, the adult sun elf noticed there was something more than just embarrassment on the young elf's face. 'Does he have a crush on her?'
He watched them bicker, and the more he saw, the more certain he was. Clearly, the boy often cooked for her as an excuse to get close. Feeling sorry for him, the man decided to lend a hand.
"Here's an idea. Why don't you teach her?"
"Teach her? With that item?" the sun elf boy asked.
The adult shook his head and put the device away. "No, no. This is rather expensive, and it's not mine. I can't give it away. But instead… how about you create the flames for her, and she uses them to cook?"
"Oh, that's a great idea!" the light elf girl shouted, excited at the opportunity of giving it a go herself. "What do you think?"
"Umm, I don't know…" The boy hesitated. He was worried that if she became better than him, she wouldn't need him anymore.
'This idiot…' The sun elf sighed inwardly. Since subtlety wasn't working, he knew he had to be more direct about it. "Hmm, maybe you're right. You'd have to spend A LOT of time together to teach her. So if you're not willing, that's understandable."
"Oh… that's true… I wouldn't want to bother you…" the girl said, disappointed.
But the boy finally understood what was going on and shouted, "Wait! I can do it!"
"Huh? Are you sure?"
He nodded vigorously. "Trust me! There's no problem! In time I bet you'll be as good as any sun elf!"
"Wow! Really?! Thank you!" She beamed at him, causing the boy's knees to nearly give out but he managed to recover himself in time.
'He has it bad…'
"Good luck, kid." Holding back the urge to laugh, the sun elf patted him on the back before turning to the other children. "As for the rest of you, here."
He handed each child a gold coin. This time, they didn't refuse. Some were hesitant, but after the stove demonstration, they were far more open minded.
"Thank you!"
"Wow!"
"I wonder how much this is worth in tokens?"
Tokens were Sylmasera's standard currency, carved from fallen Yggtree branches. These tokens were impossible to fake due to the soothing aura one felt by simply holding them. This property comes from the Yggtree's natural healing properties which was said to be able to cure any ailment.
The sun elf scratched his chin, doing some quick math. "Hmm. Not sure. But in the Kingdom of Crestelia, a gold coin could buy you around 5,000 apples."
A wood elf kid dropped the coin in shock. "5,000?! Isn't this too valuable? Are you sure?"
The elf waved it off. "It's nothing. I have plenty more. You can spend it, trade it for tokens, or keep it as a novelty, whatever you want."
As the children laughed and chatted excitedly over their shiny coins, the sun elf took a moment to observe them with a warm smile.
He turned to one of the taller boys, a wood elf, and out of curiosity asked, "You're all rather young, have you obtained your talents yet?"
The boy shook his head but replied excitedly, "Not yet! But in three years I'll be old enough to go to Yggmasera for my leveling ceremony!"
Yggmasera was the capital of Sylmasera, located at the heart of the Great Forest. It was common for elves to make the trip there for their leveling ceremonies under the shade of the Yggtree. There was no tangible benefit to doing so, but it was a tradition of the elven people said to bring good luck with their talents.
The sun elf nodded at first but froze as he realized something.
"Wait, three more years?" He gave the young elf another look and cautiously asked, "How… old are you exactly?"
"Twenty two, about to be twenty three in two months. Do I look old for my age?" The wood elf wasn't sure what was so weird about what he said. He didn't think he looked particularly old, but he was the eldest of the kids there.
"... No… you're fine. I must've gotten confused…"
Still somewhat shocked, the sun elf looked up at the orange skies and knew he had to go. He quickly bid farewell to the kids, wished them luck in their upcoming leveling ceremonies, and left town, disappearing into the wilderness.